O'Dell Hotel and Apartments - Hot Springs Bathhouse and Commercial Historic District in Truth or Consequences - Truth or Consequences, NM
Posted by: saopaulo1
N 33° 07.787 W 107° 15.373
13S E 289520 N 3667941
Now the Sierra Grande Resort and Spa.
Waymark Code: WMTJQT
Location: New Mexico, United States
Date Posted: 11/30/2016
Views: 0
"Constructed as the O'Dell Apartments in 1928-29, the Sierra Grande Lodge, as the apartments were renamed around 1950, is a two-story building with a flat roof and a curvilinear parapet with a concrete coping. With elements suggestive of the Southwest Vernacular style, the building has a facade fronted by a deep portal with multiple arches. Windows are metal casement and the entries are two-leaf, multi-light doors. The hollow-clay tile walls are faced with stucco. Two shed hoods extend over many of the second story windows, and the walls are punctuated with round clay drains, or canales. The bathhouse is located in the southeast corner of the building with an exterior bath located south of the indoor bath. Restored during the 1990s, the building now functions as a hotel and spa. A kitchen was added at the west side of the building to accommodate the restaurant. Unlike many of the tourist courts offering thermal baths that developed in the Palomas Addition adjacent to the business district, the O'Dell Apartments were located at the base of the limestone ridge from which the first springs in the thermal basin flowed. Approximately 100 yards west of the State Springs bathhouse, the O'Dell was one of the first downtown hotels to provide thermal baths, locally known as the O'Dell Plunge. As such, it became a popular bathhouse catering to both visiting health-seekers and local civic groups, which often scheduled events at the baths. Using the term apartment to denote the inclusion of a small kitchen in each hotel room, the O'Dell also offered massage treatments and attracted health-seekers who remained in Hot Springs for prolonged periods, visits often noted in the local newspapers. More recently, the property has become noteworthy as an example of a sensitive restoration of an historic hotel with a bathhouse, a precedent that community leaders hope will be followed elsewhere." (
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